ANALYTICAL STUDY OF RETAIL MALLS TO ATTAIN GREEN MARK CERTIFICATION. CASE STUDY - WHITE SANDS

Abstract

The adoption of green building strategies is vital to the built environment to minimize negative environmental and economic impacts and to improve sustainability. In the late 1990s,, the built environment industry had been focusing on promoting global green building movement through policies, green design technologies, events, rating system and such. In Singapore, BCA had launched the Green Mark Scheme, a green rating system in year 2005 with the aim to green 80% of the buildings in Singapore by 2030. However, there is a major hurdle which is the process of greening existing buildings. Therefore, the number of existing buildings becoming green is still low. Although Green Mark scheme is put in placed but there is still existence of resistance from the building owners due to the perceived high investment costs which results the existing buildings still remain energy inefficient. The operation of existing buildings usually waste a considerable amount of energy due to wear and tear of outdated building systems and lack of energy management practices causing high annual utilities' costs. Research shows that there is a high growth rate of retail buildings during the 1990s to 2010s and retail buildings are classified as the highest energy demand segment in the commerce and services sector. This study aims to provide in-depth insight on the process for a existing retail building to achieve the BCA Green Mark certification and recommendations are made for the shortfalls identified. The research methods used include interview, case study analysis and a mock Green Mark audit on a existing retail building. The results show that the existing retail building has scored below average in the BCA Green Mark assessment. This reflects that the current building performance is unsatisfactory, particularly on the air-conditioning system. Thereafter, various recommendations are made to improve its current status to achieve at least the Green Mark Gold rating. Given the right strategies and approaches, the existing building can definitely be able to see significant reduction in energy consumption and increase its sustainability.